


considered dead

by vanitaslaughing



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: 4.5 Spoilers, Ambiguous Relationships, Ambiguous Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Gen, Reminiscing, Stormblood Spoilers, but they hate each other, it's schrödinger's cidnero because they love each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-23
Updated: 2019-01-23
Packaged: 2019-10-15 06:01:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17523239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vanitaslaughing/pseuds/vanitaslaughing
Summary: For a glorious day, he had thought that Garlond was taking this well.The next day, at the break of dawn, Nero found himself dragged to an airship, on the co-pilot seat, and nearly an entire day after that, he found himself in Doma. Of all places, the Far East.





	considered dead

If nothing else, running into a familiar face usually meant there were news to be shared. Usually those were good news, seeing as Eorzea had been turned from a glass half empty to a glass half full over the past few years—whether one liked this or not was their own decision, but as time went by trickle by trickle, victory by victory, he had come to enjoy it. Somehow. Definitely was not related to the fact that it was now as it had been once, but without the empire’s almost oppressive gloom and hunger for war above their heads.

But this time around the gloom was back; and even though he was supposed to be the one who had nearly gotten himself dunked into acid and had been pulled out of that very furious Morbol’s path just in the nick of time by one of the last people he wanted to see right now.

Nero tol Scaeva half expected a speech on vanishing on people without as much as a message—as if that wasn’t his modus operandi because a Garlean on Eorzean soil was still a strange sight to behold, even moreso with the war flaring up once again. He had gone back to taking precautions, covered half his face. Most people mistook him for an adventurer anyway.

The actual adventurer, the one they called Warrior of Light nowadays, looked tired. Horrendously tired. Like someone who had been dragged halfway across the world and back only to lose everything they had worked for—last time he had checked, Eorzea remained uninvaded outside of what territory they had not managed to regain quite yet. There had not been a surge of primals lately. Honestly, even the beast tribes, tempered or not, remained rather subdued. The only trouble he had come across recently had been Alpha running between his feet when they met at Camp Overlook a while ago. Well, that and the Morbol episode.

“You look like a pan-dimensional entity tried to poison you for emotional turmoil, warrior.”

They grimaced at him, gestured vaguely, pointed out that he had been the one who had nearly gotten himself poisoned _again,_ but then fell kind of suspiciously quiet before they turned back to look at Castrum Centri in the distance. For a moment they seemed to freeze up, their already tired body sinking further when they relaxed again.

“No, I was quite serious. You do look unwell.”

It was ridiculous. Here he was, formerly one of the empire’s brightest minds, looking at Ultima’s Bane with concern after all these nonsensical but genuinely dangerous adventures they had been through together. It was like a reverse Garlond, but also half the reason how he had come to realise that the Eorzeans were not half as savage as he once assumed they were. They were just marvellously idiotic—but weren’t the Garleans the same, in a different stroke?

They shot him a smile, gestured vaguely and suggested they get out of the bog before more Morbols came their way. He agreed on that, said that he had been on his way to and through Mor Dhona to check on the Sons of Saint Coinach. Not because he had made any personal attachments but rather to survey whether the Crystal Tower remained dormant or not. Nero tol Scaeva did not have personal attachments to anyone or anything. That at least made the adventurer crack a knowing grin for a moment.

Then it was back to doom and gloom.

The trek to Mor Dhona was silent for the most part; they were not overly fond of speaking and Nero himself hated to admit that this gloomy atmosphere was getting to him as well. All of Eorzea had seemed so hopeful, so invigorated and inspired by this person’s exploits; yet here they were and something was weighing heavily on their mind.

They invited him to the Rising Stones for a spell, if only to recover from that Morbol attack. He agreed.

The entire place was a ghost town.

It had been so lively the last time he had been in there, shortly before he and Garlond had set off to look for Omega beyond Baelsar’s Wall. But now there were three people in here—counting himself and the adventurer into that. There was no loud-mouthed Leveilleur twin around, the main Scions were all suspiciously absent, and even the Echo-bearers that were part of the Scions as much as the adventurer was were not present. The one person who was here alongside them was fast asleep in the backroom, leaning against some crates with several stacks of paper scattered around them. He glanced at the mess quickly before the adventurer pulled him back into the main room and then they put a finger on their lips. Let that person sleep, he had been doing a lot of research into this issue and direly needed the sleep.

“Any reason for everyone having flown the nest like a Dodo on a rampage?”

And thus he learned why the adventurer looked so tired. How one by one the elder Scions had fallen prey to a ‘Call’ of some sort, how the remainders all set out to find a way to call them back and wake them from their slumber. They hesitated a moment as they told him how and when it happened to them, how they had turned out to be the only one remaining alongside that girl Krile who in turn had set out to find someone who might know more about this than she did. Poignant silence spread through the Rising Stones—bewildering by itself—and for the longest time the adventurer stared at the door. Maybe they were expecting some wounded woman to burst in again and plead for help, maybe they expected another Samurai, another former Garlean, maybe their companions.

But nothing happened.

They closed their eyes. Rather than continuing their explanation of how they had found the Leveilleur boy and then lost the Leveilleur girl to sleep, they folded their hands and sunk deeper into the chair.

“Cid was considered dead for the longest time. You’re considered dead by the empire, aren’t you?”

He blinked a few times. “Yes? Killed by the Eikon Slayer in Castrum Meridianum, dead before the Black Wolf.”

They were… unusually chatty. It was unsettling on many levels, but considering that they took a rather deep breath as he said that… there were quite a few things that they could say next. He half dreaded them saying something that involved Garlond—was he even part of the Scions? If Garlond was down and out for the count, Nero would be the one raising enough hell to get him up only to gloat about it afterwards, he swore as he curled his hands into fists in his lap.

But the adventurer only shook their head. “The person who brought us Alphinaud all but cradled in his arms. A man considered dead by everyone, consumed by the very flames that near swallowed you, me, Cid, my fellow adventurers and everyone in Castrum Meridianum. We should have guessed, given that we all survived but him… Gaius van Baelsar lives.”

* * *

He had left once they explained how and where they had run into the man, where he had gone. Then they said that they had wanted to tell Garlond but the man was rather hard to get a hold of; they had cracked a tired smile and said that they had somehow managed to find the harder to find out of the two Garleans they knew were on their side.

Thus Nero had sighed and decided to trade duties; the adventurer left for the Sons of Saint Coinach with a greeting from Nero, Nero himself set out to go find his old darling friend and his co-workers. They parted ways with narrowing eyes at each other and saying that the other should rest at the same time, and that was that.

He knew that the shop in Mor Dhona would be empty. There was only one place Garlond himself could be—the frontlines, because that man had no sense of self-preservation whatsoever. Which in turn meant that he would have to take a Chocobo up to Ishgard and take an airship to Gyr Abania from there.

Great.

Though if he wasn’t on with the alliance, he was likely with his people at the Reach, which was considerably less of a hassle to deal with.

On second thought, he was just going to take the scenic route. The war was at a stalemate for the time being, the alliance and the empire evenly matched as of right now. Taking a week or two to slowly trudge through Gyr Abania and get to Rhalgr’s Reach sounded right. Maybe he could figure out what to tell his good old nemesis in the meanwhile. The adventurer had already struggled with how to say it, but there was absolutely nothing Nero could think of—for once. For once he was legitimately rendered speechless.

As much as he enjoyed tormenting Garlond, this might turn out to be… quite a blow. They both considered Gaius van Baelsar an important part of their lives, a turning point in one way or another. A man to look up to instead of the father falling further and further from sanity—a man who acknowledged a brilliant mind in desperate need of attention. Castrum Meridianum was a turning point in their lives, the Black Wolf’s death was something that set the gears leading their eventual trip to the Interdimensional Rift as comrades rather than enemies in motion. Garlond had grieved for a while after Operation Archon, Nero had buried his mild regrets before approaching the adventurer in Mor Dhona wearing barely a disguise and definitely counting on them not remembering his voice.

And now that man had the gall of being alive. Well, even, were the adventurer to be believed.

Halfway through the Fringes, after crossing the Velodyna, he stopped at some point and turned to look back at Baelsar’s Wall.

Huh. It felt like forever and a lifetime ago that something that looked like a second coming of Dalamud hung over this wall, and considering how plainly visible it had been from the Alliance side of the wall it likely had been just as bright and strange a sight to behold from this side of it as well. Forever and a lifetime ago that the Alliance had agreed to the obvious solution, the obvious solution that inevitably led to the conclusion of the story, to the termination of any threat that Omega could have ever been to the Alliance after all this. It had all just come to this because with the Black Wolf dead the XIVth had all but scattered, and Nero himself was considered just as dead as his superior. As dead as Livia was. As dead as all those soldiers mindlessly following their leaders were. … As dead as Cid Garlond had been considered after the Calamity by most people.

By the heavens, by the Eorzean Twelve he did not worship—Garlond was either going to overreact or not react at all to this, was he? And in the event that he did not react, it would be Nero who would be left with thinking about it endlessly, his mind running laps around every tiny shred of information the Warrior of Light had parted with.

Good grief.

He almost hoped that Garlond would overreact. Even if an overreacting Garlond was both amusing and absolutely impossible to deal with—it would at least stop him from thinking.

* * *

The idiot had the _gall_ to dodge the wrench with a heavy sigh.

If anyone had had any reason to sigh in this very moment, it would have been Cid. He had half expected someone to drag Nero back at some point, injured once again, dead, or worse even, in debt. Jessie would have chewed both their heads off had it been the latter.

“You’ve got some nerve.”

“Oh, please. We both know we have long since shed with the nerves and moved on to grating tolerance. It is nice to see you hale and whole during times of unrest, however, Garlond.”

“… Likewise.” Nero likely knew that there was an unspoken insult hanging in the air, and if he didn’t, well, Cid did not care the slightest (oh yes, he cared, both about the insult being known and about Nero, _unfortunately)._

They moved on to what other people might consider pleasant conversation. Anyone who had spent more than two minutes with them knew however that this was a battle between them, somehow, something that Cid had missed quite a lot more than he wanted to admit but also something he loathed. Having Nero around just turned everything into this confusing (obvious) set of conflicting (complementing) emotions. But before long, Cid noticed that Nero seemed a lot more… distant than usual. Normally he held himself with this insufferable (but very familiar) air around him, a smug grin on his face and the intention of being a horrible inconvenience if he couldn’t prove himself superior. It had already been the case back after the Sigmascape incident, after he had collapsed. Once the proud idiocy had subsided and given way to delirium, he’d been as spaced out as that.

Part of him wanted to ask if Nero was okay. The other part of him already knew that the man was going to act like an insulted child if he did that, and therefore Cid chose to cross his arms. “How about we go on a walk, then?”

A long pause, then Nero tiled his head and looked at him out of the corners of his eyes. “Planning to bury me alive and feed me to the tempered beastwomen or the giant feral ants?”

“The Ananta do not consume Spoken flesh. The ants do, yes, but I’m afraid feeding you to them would cause them to go extinct, thus upsetting the already upset balance in the Fringes even further. So no. I won’t.” He started walking, knowing full well that Nero would follow.

It was a routine, one that had somehow survived through the years they had known each other, survived the times they considered the other dead. Whatever it was that was throwing Nero off-balance, it was something that also affected Cid—otherwise he would not be here. There were a few things he could think of, but nothing really came to mind other than the collapsed Scions. They had been trying to figure out a way to help rouse them from their slumber, but there was precious little all of Ironworks could do without having an idea what to build. Something that dealt with aether, something that could reverse a Calling, something, anything.

Nero was oddly quiet as they crossed the Reach. There were fewer people than usual around, what with a lot of the locals involved with the war effort. That one Scion trio that generally hung around here, those kids who had the Echo just as the Warrior of Light had, were also not present; they had joined a Velodyna Gatekeeper group this morning and had not been seen since. They were likely out checking if the tempered tribe was active again in any way, especially with how tense things had been immediately following that summoning in Ala Mhigo.

“Those armour design notes you left in the workshop are actually half-decent,” Cid said slowly, trying to strike up a conversation. Thankfully (infuriatingly) all he got from Nero was a low hum instead of a grandiose boast as the man was normally like to do whenever his creations were involved. He stopped beside the creek that led out of the Reach and towards the Velodyna eventually and turned around. “Okay. Something is definitely up. Pray tell, what’s eating you so much that you aren’t reacting to a jab like that, old nuisance mine?”

That was a look he had only seen once on Nero’s face—back when he had been on the brink of death, when the smugness of having held out that long to guarantee a victory at nearly the cost of his own life had faded and he had gone delirious. Which meant that he was using his braincells for something that wasn’t trying to one-up his fellow engineer. In turn, a worrying development—normally Nero was just about the last person to legitimately think unless he could prove himself the best person in the room somehow.

Nero sighed once again and looked around. Familiar sights, if nothing else; they had both marched across this part of Eorzea time and time again while monitoring Omega. Cid and the Ironworks employees that had been stationed outside at the time had dragged Nero back to the Reach after what had happened in the Sigmascape.

“For once in our lives, let me ask you a sincere question. The adventurer you call Warrior of Light already struggled with how to deliver these words to me, so. The hard way or the easy way, Garlond?”

Well, that was suitably ominous coming from a certain Nero tol Scaeva’s mouth.

“Did you accidentally dabble in legitimate Allagan tech-necromancy and managed to awaken a machine more powerful than Ultima, Alexander and Omega put together?”

There was that look of disgust that Cid had long since gotten used to (and that he had missed more than he wanted to admit), but it lacked its usual glaring and scathing distaste.

“… This is really bothering you, isn’t it. Well then, short and sweet, Nero.”

* * *

“I’ve been on many bogus adventures with you since the empire started considering me dead and buried under the Castrum, but this, Garlond, truly and entirely takes the Rolanberry cake. … There’s not even any sort of trail to follow. Please. Please just… stop whatever it is you’re doing.”

“Be quiet. If another worm attacks us because of your insistence on whining like a child of seven summers on a trip with his parents, be my guest, but I _will_ let it try to devour you and in the event of your survival, _will_ leave you here.”

For a glorious day, he had thought that Garlond was taking this well. The next day, at the break of dawn, Nero found himself dragged to an airship, on the co-pilot seat, and nearly an entire day after that, he found himself in Doma. Of all places, the Far East. Those of the Ironworks employees who couldn’t teleport that had been sent here to make certain that wall worked were still here and packing up their belongings, and every single one of them had nearly fallen backwards when they saw their chief. Cid got his directions to the Burn, where the Warrior of Light and the Lady Alisaie had encountered van Baelsar as he attempted to return the boy to the country that he had been sent out from.

“He had an airship according to the adventurer,” Nero started half an hour later, still following the madman around rather than actively helping, “trudging through the wastelands and kicking up dust and aggravating flesh-eating worms will definitely not draw him out.”

He wouldn’t consider the Burn a place he wanted to spend another ten minutes in, but he had honestly lost track of where they were. Garlond was still impressively angrily stomping forward, turned over every other bone and looked around with his eyes narrowed. He was half expecting the man to start calling for van Baelsar with that annoyingly loud voice of his.

The sun reflecting off the white wastes was positively blinding, and though he had mostly healed by now, Nero still was not considered wholly healthy. It had been a week. A lousy week since he had been dragged here by that man and a week since he’d slept in a proper bed. He was honestly wondering where Garlond had even gotten the provisions for a trip like this for; considering that the Reach had been prepped for people injured in combat that required a little more intensive care than Ala Mhigo and the battlefield conjurers could provide. How and where he had gotten all that stuff from in perfect travel condition, it was completely beyond him. Eorzeans and Eorzea-adjacent people were all either mad or miracle workers.

This place on the other hand was far from a miracle. Extremely far from a miracle. No, perhaps a miracle but in the bad way. Were the negative miracles? Was there a word for them? Where was he again?

And one thing led to the next, and Nero found his legs were a lot weaker than he had originally believed they were. Damned traitors, giving in and making him sink to the dusty dead ground, and damned lungs of his giving out a dry cough-wheeze-sigh that betrayed hos exhausted he actually was.

Much to his surprise Garlond actually noticed, turned around and was immediately by his side.

“So, where’s the worm you’ll feed me to…?”

“Idiot. We’re taking a break.”

* * *

For a desert-looking wasteland, the Burn was surprisingly temperate. Barren, he figured, as they sat there in complete and utter silence. Nero had left the infirmary too early back then, and had since then taken it slow, yes, but he had not recovered properly. Biggs and Wedge had been forced to rest and recover properly, they had had more time for it, and were definitely less of stupid stubborn brats when it came to any of that.

He had a point though. There was no way they were going to find any trace of the man without taking an airship and going back to empire-controlled regions. Regions where they would be shot on sight for being traitors—regions where they were still or had been considered dead for the longest time, much like the man Cid was chasing.

He blinked a few times and turned to look at Nero. Nero looked back through his half-closed eyes.

“Hey, uh, Nero?”

The man closed his eyes. “Still alive, ‘ere you ask. And awake. Unfortunately.”

“Yeah, topical. When I was considered dead after the Calamity—what exactly went through your head?”

There was a long moment of silence. The Burn was eerily quiet to begin with, all sounds drowned out by hills long dead and covered in this white sand that was devoid of all aether. But something about Nero being quiet added another heinous layer to this.

Then, eventually, he broke the silence with a small laugh. “Not much. Someone made certain I was preoccupied after the fact, likely afraid that I would starve myself to death out of anger. How dare that damned meteor kill you before I got the chance, or something. At least that was what he said he assumed went through my head, and made certain my genius was being used rather than wasting away somewhere. Let me guess, you thought nothing at all when I escaped without you knowing?”

It was Cid’s turn to laugh. “Oh, no. I had a feeling. You’re a rotten pest, impossible to get rid of, and impossible to kill. But a rotten pest needs rest every so often. I just assumed you were lying low to heal.”

There was a grumble, the other man clearly not pleased with that. He was never pleased with anything that Cid said, though, so that was to be expected.

More time passed as the sun failed to properly warm up the place, and the white turned from inconveniently blinding to grating on the eyes. Somewhere in the distance the barrier shone; Nero and Cid had taken a long, _long_ way around to to wind up in the Burn.

“… You’re not sure what to think, are you?” Nero’s voice was just a whisper, clearly very tired by now. “You’ve got no clue what to think now that you know the Black Wolf is alive, and that’s why you stormed off to find him like a confused angry kid running after their relative who just tried to leave ‘em in the emperor’s kitchen as butler-in-the-making. So you wanna find him, and yell at him. Long. Loudly. Then glare at him with that… pout on your face once you’re done.”

With that, Nero passed out and left Cid sitting on the barren ground wide awake, staring at the setting sun and watching the moon rise.

He was right.

Cid only wanted to yell at the man because he was not sure what to think about this. Whether he was glad that a man who had been so important to him once was still alive, or if he was just angry at this man still. He could still smell the fire and the ceruleum of that day at Castrum Meridianum, could still see the group of adventurers that had gone with the Warrior of Light emerging and telling Cid to run because something was going to happen sooner or later and they had no chance of stopping it. Could still see how much blood had been spilled to win that victory for Eorzea.

He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed deeply.

Dragging a recovering man through a wasteland was pointless. He would have to get Nero back to Doma, and the already cold trail would only get colder if he decided to return to this place to look for the man who hunted shadows.

Cid opted against trying to chase another phantom. He’d done his time with his father, with Gaius before all of this, with his own damned memories at some point. He was done chasing things around only to yell at them once he found them.

Besides, he still had Nero—he could (and always would) yell at him if the need arose. As long as the slippery bastard didn’t take off without even so much as a farewell as soon as he was better once again.

* * *

“… and that pretty much concludes that story.”

A dry laugh from the co-pilot’s seat. “That has to be the most ridiculous tale I’ve ever heard. And I’ve heard plenty, especially out of your mouth, Garlond.”

“Heard them while we were on my ‘bogus adventures’, have you?”

“That _was_ one of your bogus adventures. The adventurer created a stable time loop by travelling back into the past and saving themselves and you, setting you up for being able to get to that point where they went back in time to save you in the first place? Please. That is even more ridiculous than the cyborg Goblin. Or the kitten.”

Cid had decided that the Mothercrystal always found a way to make the right thing happen in the correct moment. Knowing that Gaius van Baelsar was alive meant that one day, inevitably so, he’d come face to face with that man who now called himself only Gaius Baelsar—just as Cid only called himself Cid Garlond these days.

Before long Nero would just be Nero Scaeva too. All three of them people who had worked together for Garlemald, however begrudgingly.

All three of them men who were at some point considered dead.

It was kind of hilarious to think about. Not even a Calamity or nearly a Calamity had managed to kill them yet. They had all nearly died at the whims of a machine with its own mind or under the control of someone else; Gaius and Ultima, Cid and Alexander, Nero and Omega.

There’d be a time and place to yell at the man. Eventually. He just needed to wait as the Warrior of Light waited for the other Scions or their own Call.

He leaned over a little. “Come now, the kitten had to have been your favourite part.”

Nero also leaned over, shrugged, and then shoved a hand into Cid’s face. “Do not put words in my mouth, Cidolfus nan Garlond.”

“Say my full name again and I’ll leave you floating in the Sirensong Sea, Nero tol Scaeva.”

He wouldn’t. Nero knew that. Just as Cid himself knew that this slippery bastard of a Garlean would find a way to vanish again after this little excursion. Hells, he even considered asking him not to go this time around—but trying to keep Nero in one place around him was like trying to hug a voidsent Pudding. Just as vile no matter how much he cared about it, and impossible to begin with.

He’d live. Just as he would run into Gaius before long, Nero would also come around when the time was right, as he had this time. And maybe next time he’d stay properly for once.

**Author's Note:**

> (stomps on my writers block) anyway,
> 
> "cidolfus nan garlond" is pretty much a joke my friend cracked while i was writing this and it, was perfect for that ending  
> thanks for coming to my ted talk.


End file.
